Have to say, I Sky +'d the preview show, and having watched it back, I was very impressed. The more they have of Damon and MB chatting the better, the two 'Regular' sky presenters held it together well and the tech stuff was good too. Really looking forward to seeing what they do with all that screen time and money, giving MB the freedom to make extensive features will mean I'll definitely be tuning in.
Likewise, I was also quite impressed. It does seem to have gained an extra nerdy level with the amount of tech stuff being. All good for me
Agreed, the only part of the program I didn't like was that 'Fenners' tripe, but I guess that wasn't aimed at people like me, but newcomers. They also made it sound like he'll be nowhere near race weekends, which undoubtedly a Good Thing.
I didn't care for it much, if I'd produced it, it would have been 15 minutes long. I did like the story from Jim Barber, or Baker... or was it Candlestick-Maker. It was about Jacques Villeneuve joining the Williams team, and that coming from a different culture, he didn't know much and was asking in the team at the beginning of his first wet race what gear he should start in.
I enjoyed it, I loved how they didn't have to dumb anything down, the talk was quite technical and in-depth. The Fenners bit was quite amusing, he's a likeable cheeky chappy and I hope to see more of him, particularly if he can get some driver interviews at the races as his line of questioning would be completely different to the usual obvious questions drivers get asked. Top marks Sky, keep it up.
Yes, that was a nice departure from the usual piercing questions. I always liked the straight talking Kimi, and Mikka's short answers. Like from Top Gear - the question "How import is your head?" (paraphrased to the concise meaning of what was being asked)
Speaking of Technical: Craig Scarborough has finally updated his site again with the VJM05 Analysis and the Sauber C31 analysis. I hate the fact that nowadays I need an Autosport subscription to read his thoughts more regularly. Other than that, Whitmarsh seems positive that no team has absolute dominance. And Jenson seems to be oozing confidence, which might be bluffing or might be real... all will be revealed.
It's a shame, but it's also a good thing that he's being recognised by the publications for his excellent tech work. He'll always update his blog eventually, I'm not too worried. He's got quite an interesting series on how an F1 car works on a greek site that I saw yesterday, but can't remember the name now. :\
Yeah... he's brilliant at describing technical aspects and considerations, and it's great for him that he's being recognised for it. If you remember the site, post it here, so we can all enjoy.
Found it! No wonder it took me ages to find - a tweet of a blog post of a link of this site. It's not that complex, but it says it should be a "series" of articles.
Speaking of Craig Scarborough, he has a new bit up about a potential DRS-activated F-Duct front wing. Technically this would be legal until Whiting decides otherwise, and if it works, it means that cars are balanced better while opening DRS in corners (practice and qualifying), as well as allowing possible ride-height reductions, more DRS benefit, etc once the DRS is opened.
Three posts in a row: FP1 and 2 are done, and showed sweet nothing at all, except for the Ferrari looking VERY loose on the track, whcih makes it unlikely that they have a rabbit in a hat somewhere (at least not until their new chassis is rumored to be completed by the time the circus moves to Spain). bad weather, limited running, and HRT looks unlikely to even make it to the start...
Bloody adverts in practice are already annoying me. Looks like I'll be sky+ing the session to ffwd the breaks.
Talking of Sky+ I've just noticed Sky have split the warm-up show from both the qualifying and the race on the EPG so you can choose to record just the qualifying/race which is nice.
I watched the first practice, clearly there's a ton of sandbagging going on and, as always, it wont be until quali that we really see who's got the pace. It was great to see that we're getting some proper helmet cameras though, you really get an idea of how rough street circuits can be. Can't wait to see the helmet cams through Eau Rouge and 130R
Important news if you intend to Sky+ the frst race. Important news if you intend to Sky+ the frst race. Please note that Sky's EPG counts the start of a day as being 6am, and not midnight. What does this mean: This can cause an issue with programs which straddle the 6am timeslot. The Australian GP will have two entries in the Sky EPG, so if you intend to Sky+ the Australian GP make sure you record both of the entries (the one before 6am and the one post 6am). If you have selected series link record this shouldn't be a problem, but I'd check anyway. What about remote record: If you remote record the programme starting at 6:00am the recording will fail and you will not be notified. This is due to a live issue with remote recordings of programmes which start at 6am a future fix is planned for this.
It's sucking to be a non sky customer right now. At least we still get to see the the races from the worst tracks on the calendar. Spa and Interlagos the only ones I like (of the live bbc coverage), Silverstone I can take it or leave it.
Great quali. Where did Grojean come from to get there!! Good to see anyone of 4 teams battling it out. Well worth getting up for.
Could not have wished for a better start to the season. No team showing complete dominance in terms of pace, a McLaren front row lockout, Hamilton on pole, Ferrari doing terrible and Vettel being outqualified by his teammate. Now to hope the rest of the season continues in a similar fashion.